


A Man In a Hat and His Cat

by FortuneSurfer



Category: Justified
Genre: Alternate Universe - His Dark Materials Fusion, Episode Related, Episode: s01e01 Pilot, F/M, Gen, M/M, Season/Series 01, daemon AU, retelling-ish, tbh Ava/Raylan is a minor one, tbh Tim/Raylan as well
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-10-06
Packaged: 2020-07-30 11:24:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20096485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FortuneSurfer/pseuds/FortuneSurfer
Summary: It's Justified with the slightly modified daemon premise.





	1. and Dan

**Author's Note:**

> I'm still beta-less and not fully functional, but I'm doing my best!
> 
> I love feedback and talking to fellow fans, so, I would love to hear if you like or dislike the story I am sharing with you!

“Anybody ever told you, Dan, you’ve got an intense eye lock? Like, I dunno, a really big bird of prey?” deadpans Raylan, and Dan huffs out a chuckle despite himself. He hears Nadeen behind his back doing the same, and now that the tension in the office is slightly eased up, Raylan bares his teeth in his lady killer grin. But the other pair of eyes across from Dan keeps peering at him with suspicion.

Dan is nothing if not a straightforward man, it’s not like you have other options with a harpy eagle for a daemon, and so he tells it like it is.

“Look, you wear what you wear, and you are what you are.” He nods at the notorious hat and at Nora sitting beside Raylan respectively. Raylan’s squint that follows after gives his grin the subliminal quality of a friendly warning. ”And I put up with it ‘cause you get the job done.” Nadeen shifts her weight on her porch behind Dan, and the rustling of her plumage has a reassuring effect on him as always. “‘Cept now I’m to understand you’ve become a target for all the mental wizards out there who wanna prove themselves.”

Raylan attempts to correct him: “I don’t know if you can generalize from the word of two carjackers—“

But Nadeen cuts him off by spreading her majestic wings behind Dan’s back in a silent command to keep quiet. And Raylan frowns and purses his lips but knows better than to go on. “You think they’re the only ones talking this shit? It’s all through the FDC. Apparently there’s a long line of idiots who want a crack at you.”

Dan waves away with his hand to emphasize the sheer scope of the problem because ask anybody on the street and they'll tell you that it's more likely that this place will see a shortage of oranges than a shortage of idiots anytime soon.

Raylan lowers his head so that the brim of the hat hides his eyes.

“And as much as I’d like to frame this as my concern for your safety,” Dan continues and snorts, “it also wouldn’t look real good if one of my deputies is gunned down in a shootout with some yahoo who wants to prove he’s the quicker draw.”

“What makes you think we’d lose?” suddenly asks a voice Dan has never heard before, and Nadeen lets out an astonished screeching.

The same modulations, the same accent. The same calm, strong will. Raylan through and through.

Momentarily forgetting all his manners, Dan looks the daemon in the eyes. Unabashedly looking back at him is a wild, strong, and intelligent beast who knows exactly what it can. 

Then, Raylan buries his fingers in her coat and asks in a pacifying tone: “So, you want me to take some time off?”

And Dan has to collect himself because he shamefully discovers that he was staring with his mouth open.

A week later, rumor has it a former associate of Rollie Pike has been seen in Ocala, and sure enough Tommy Bucks resurfaces in Miami like an Italian-eyed fly drawn to a load of crap. And of course, reprimanded or not, Raylan just can’t stay away, and the meerkat daemon of Bucks goes out like a candle on the rooftop of that hotel not even 24 hours after Raylan is back for duty. And from there on, everything goes to hell in a handbasket.

Whenever he remembers the eyes of Nora, the eyes of Raylan, Dan think that it was bound to happen; and can’t help quietly wondering if he is a bad boss.

At the end of the two never-ending weeks of investigation, calls from his superiors riding his ass, headache pills, and a couple of feathers falling out of Nadeen, Dan thanks God for Chief Deputy Art Mullen, who isn’t thinking twice about giving him a hand and no doubt will regret this decision in the future.

And yet, one evening a month later, Dan catches himself lingering with his gaze to Raylan‘s former desk, which is not coincidentally positioned in his line of sight. For a whole month, nobody has been casually breaking the dress code of the office and no black bobbed tail has been seen strolling around the tables. There is too much space without the cradle where somebody’s daemon used to groom herself in. And it’s almost like an important part of sunset is missing when nobody’s gorgeous fur is caught on fire by the sunlight shining through the gigantic windows of their office.

And all of a sudden there is no one around who can put him in a confident and relaxed mood with a single dry astute remark.

Knowing he’s no longer working, Nadeen jumps at his desk, careful not to sweep off any documents, her talons loudly knocking on the table tap. She tells him: 

“They say cats are the life and soul of a house,” and tilts her head a little with a mischievous glint in her eyes. Dan looks at her and scratches his ear.

“You think a Persian kitten will do?”

She playfully pecks at him.

“Not for too long.”

Dan sighs.

“I thought so.”


	2. and Art (and Tim, and Rachel)

Sure, Art hears Raylan’s voice on the phone, asking him if he has the time to meet up with him today already, right after Raylan takes care of his living arrangements, and later there is a call from the security guys on the first floor, willing to know if a cowboy fella has lost his way or has an invitation. But the story of a certain marshal Givens coming to Kentucky to be Art’s personal pain in the ass doesn‘t start on either of those occasions. Like the best stories, it starts with a melodic whistle.

The sound comes from Tais, Art’s own daemon, who’s monitoring the elevators for him. 

She carries out the ending of a famous tune as sweetly and clearly as only a bird can, and with such delicate sensibility to the message that the balance of the music’s dreaminess and fearful apprehension is ideally maintained. Art smirks to himself and raises his head to look across the room. It used to be their little joke back in Glynco._ You may think he's a sleepy tired guy, always takes his time__…_ Here comes the trouble and all that. Although, the signal was by no means devoid of appreciation, and it ain‘t now. 

But the trouble starts virtually the very same moment Raylan opens the door, when Ed and his beagle daemon Dorothy, who were leaving through the other door, turn around, startled. It is safe to say that the entry of an unknown long-limbed man in a Stetson and his daemon with her limbs just as long has the same effect of instant quietness on the office as that of a stranger on a 19th century saloon.

Art sighs in frustration. Really, it‘s his bad, too: he was going to pack swiftly and meet Raylan halfway to inform him on everything and everybody before the team would get to see the unforgettable duo he and Nora are. Well, hell. Now, he naturally expects all tongues to start wagging as soon as they leave. A lynx for a daemon is not the same jaw-dropping sensation as a, let’s say, T-Rex or a species still waiting to be discovered by science, but still quite a spectacle in the absence of some freakishly looking creatures. And there will always be the usual fuss about a big predator among colleagues – you can’t take people’s prejudices from ’em, it’s what they learn to get rid of themselves.

But he is the boss, and he’ll facilitate the task.

Art comes to help to Raylan (who is uncomfortably looking around) and Nora (sniffling the air), purposefully making his movements appear leisurely as he crosses the room, even though he would prefer to get them into his office as fast as he can. But Art is aware that he has to show that, first, Raylan’s arrival, as much entertainment it is, should not be a big deal, and second, stupid but necessary, that he is not afraid of them. The fact that Tais doesn’t follow him, as she never does when there is nothing to worry about, effectively complements his gesture.

“A bit of a comedown from the Miami office, I'd expect.”

They both turn their heads to him in perfect synchrony.

“Oh, not with you here,” Raylan grins, the charming smooth talker as always, and Art can’t help laughing and admitting: “Good to see you.”

When Raylan extends his hand to him, though, Art grabs it and quickly, heartily crushes it, like they‘re in the middle of an arm wrestling match, not because Art is that kind of excessively dominant boss, or at least doesn’t think that he is, but because he must immediately enforce a certain dynamic on their relationship, and there is never too big of a window for that with Raylan; after all, the man is a cat in his heart of hearts. And now also not just a friend, and a former colleague, but first and foremost his subordinate, and Art feels that it should be made clear to both of them from the start.

Raylan doesn’t cringe, but his eyes narrow, and his grin is not a toothy one anymore. Art imagines he suspects that he needs a bit of his submission in front of the office to calm the folks down. And he can‘t deny that it is a nice bonus.

“All I know is it's nice to see an office with a sense of tradition,” says Nora, who has moved away from them and is now staring at the poster of the older generations of marshals as well as probably at a gun decoration hanging right below it.

“Well, what would be the point of having a long and rich history if we couldn‘t shamelessly show it off?” asks Art, concealing his surprise well; she’s never been much of a chatterbox. “Gotta keep hold of who we are.”

“Ain’t that right,” replies Raylan in that ironic tone of his, which, in Art’s experience, is secretly a thoughtful one. And Art honestly doesn’t know what does this moment remind him more of – his dialog with the chief in Miami or the words of the damn song. _Always cool, he's the best. He keeps alive with his Colt 45._

**Sandy**, whispers agitated Tais in his head and sends him the image of the woman standing by the printer, waiting for them to clear the way to her desk, as her hands tightly press a folder to her chest and her moth daemon sits motionlessly at her shoulder, as if afraid to be noticed.

Art claps Raylan on the shoulder to get his attention and suggests:

“Well, I won't overwhelm you with everybody's name right now. You want to go have a drink?”

Of course. Raylan wouldn’t be himself if he refused.

Not without briefly looking at Nora, Art escorts them to his office and gives Raylan his opinion on his never-changing looks. Not that he expected him to change much, but not to change at all is kind of a statement. And he needs to set the ball rolling with some friendly banter, too, since with him cats tend to be inactive and disinterested, apart from being minds of their own as they always are.

In his office, Raylan respectfully tips the brim of his head when he sees Tais watching him from the top of the drawer, and they leave it at that. Nora gives her a single short look, but that’s more than enough material. **Her eyes got wilder, **Tais tells Art, openly concerned. **And his, too, by the way.**

Art is glad to have a distraction in form of his phone calling because otherwise he would be tempted to inspect Raylan again, as if he doesn’t sense in him what Tais is referring to.

“Have a seat. Nora can lie down on the couch if she wants to.”

Raylan accepts the invitation, but Nora notes without making any movement towards the couch:

“Didn’t you say we were fixing to go out?” 

Amused by that, Tais chirps from her spot. Cats think they are difficult to read but in truth they constantly betray themselves.

“Sadly, loads of desk work on a daily basis get the best even of titans, so, forgive me for not being as brisk as I used to be,” jokes Art, knowing how to hide his amusement behind cancelling the phone call. 

They haven’t taught side by side for years for nothing, and Raylan knows him well, which makes Art‘s task more interesting, apart from being important. He needs to conduct an interrogation, and there is no reason not to disguise it as civil conversation. Maybe there will be no formal introduction to the team and no granting of the desk tomorrow: true, they had taught shooting together for a couple of years, but they haven‘t seen each other since then for much longer than that. And it’s not like what Art sees now isn’t worrying. After a short deliberation, Nora jumps on the couch, though, but demonstratively turns away from them – and most of all from Tais’s stern and inquisitive gaze, of course – to overlook the office through the window.

“And speaking of work. You were working fugitives in Miami, huh?”

“Yeah, I did.”

“Yeah, well, here, everybody does everything...” Art assures. “Fugitives, witness relocation, judicial protection, Forfeitures, prisoner transport. Boy, every office I ever worked in, prisoner transport was the shit detail... chief always used it as punishment. But here we all do it.”

“Even you?”

That question comes from Raylan, and Art laughs (“Oh, hell, no!”) partly because he knows that Raylan must sense what kind of a trap he is setting for him. And somehow that makes Art think twice about his plan to start slowly with Raylan and indeed assign him to prison transport for some indefinite probationary period.

It still feels like a misstep, and Art admittedly rather bluntly changes the subject to Winona, allowing Tais to do most of the observing for him, while he continues to pack. She left him, and he still hasn’t come to terms with her decision, so much is obvious even from the composed but simultaneously bewildered way Raylan sounds when asking about if Winona works here, in Lexington_. _Not to mention the curious twitch of Nora’s ears and how he tries to excuse himself for not knowing about Winona’s life at the moment – their divorce must have been a painful one if they haven’t talked for so long – by vaguely remembering Winona’s late mother who, Raylan heard, apparently must have taken ill. 

Art takes pity on him and spares the man further humiliation, closing the topic with a friendly mocking:

“Well, I thought that was why you picked Kentucky.”

“Art, no offense...” Raylan starts, raising his eyebrows for emphasis and grinning joylessly, and the pause that he makes speaks volumes about how much he detests being home where everything speaks to him. “I didn't pick Kentucky.”

Art laughs. He honestly loves it about Raylan: he always states it like it is. Sometimes it’s downright stupid of him, but all the other times it’s refreshing. And it’s also an organic transition to why Raylan ended here, which is why Art invites Raylan to share his version of the encounter on the roof of that hotel.

“It was justified.”

Art doesn’t feel the need to hide how much he is disappointed by this confession. He presses his lips together, and Tais, she beats her wings – twice! thrice! – momentarily ceasing to be an almost inconspicuously looking medium-sized parrot, as her blood-red plumage is showing between the beats, like a warning sign. At once, Raylan’s innocently raised eyebrows go down in a furrow. The change in his expression is as ludicrously fast as the man’s draw.

“You concerned about me coming down here?”

Raylan is glaring at him intently. And Nora is no longer fainting disinterest; no, now she stands up on the couch.

Art knows how to more or less pacify him and, without blinking an eye, avoids the quarrel with the help of an elusion.

“It's a small office, Raylan. I'm concerned when we switch brands of coffee.” And Raylan generously accepts that. “Is your dad still down there in Harlan?”

**Look at his face, it’s like the air got sour.**

“Far as I know.”

“Thought you were from There,” Art muses, capitalizing “there” with his tone. **He took it as a mild insult**, Tais notes, and Art thinks that, knowing Harlan, there is no other way of taking it. He packs the rest of the folders, as he proceeds to explain: “Reason I ask... the U.S. Attorney’s trying to build this case against this guy in Harlan. And he’s about the same age as you, it’s a small town, thought you might know him...” Art closes his brief case and names the guy without much hope, really; after all Raylan must have done his darnest to forget the shithole he grew up in and all its loony inhabitants. “Boyd Crowder.”

And then something strange happens. Behind Raylan’s back, Nora goes perfectly still, and a loud cracking of leather under her claws suggests that they gently plunge into Art’s beloved sofa. But Art has no time to react to that because simultaneously Raylan asks him, indignant: “My god, Art, any other shit you want to dump on me tonight?” giving him and Tais one more peak at the passive aggression boiling inside of him.

“You do know him.”

“Yeah. I know him.” Raylan replies readily. He accompanies his words with what sounds like an involuntary pleased laughter. He goes still for a moment, just like Nora right before him, and in that moment, a delighted smile plays on his lips, and his eyes are dreamy like Art has never seen them before. “Boyd and I dug coal together when we were 19.”

**Well, that story must be worth the couch.**

*

As soon as Chief and his remarkable guest (as well as their future remarkable colleague) with his remarkable feline daemon and Tais leave the office, Rachel lays down the phone she was no longer speaking on and turns to Tim with a ‘did you see that?’ all over her face. Oh, yes, he did see that.

Tim tells her sententiously: 

“Cats are lazy assholes.”

“No, they simply know how to make their lives easier.”

“That’s what I said: lazy assholes.”

Rachel rolls her eyes to not laugh at his words – that‘s what Luke, her porcupine daemon, does – and counters: “Give him a chance. The guy is friends with Chief, so, he must have his smarts. And I personally feel like he’ll be an asset.”

“An ass-et, huh?” asks Tim, stressing the word inside a word, and now she does laugh a little despite herself. “Just don’t come to me when he’ll start sending you to run his errands, okay?”

“Oh, and what makes you think it won’t be you?” Rachel asks, her voice caramel, damn her, and Tim doesn’t look at her or Luke, when he answers, lowering his voice so that only she can hear him: “Please. I’m the soldier kind of guy. Cowboys are not my profile.”

“We’ll see,” Rachel says to that, like she is making a bet. Because she is.

“Anyway, how’s that Harper thing going?”

Not for the first time in his life, Tim is thankful for how difficult it is to tell where an armadillo daemon is looking: Marissa steals a glance in the direction in that chief and the new marshal went, and Tim swallows, hoping Rachel doesn’t catch it either.

*

It’s not often that they argue, but as they walk out of the bar, it seems like they almost do.

“Did you hear what she asked when you retold them the latest part of Crowder’s biography? ‘How much is true?’ Nora! Imagine that,” Tais exclaims, sitting on Art’s shoulder, barely able to believe her own words. “And did you see what she did when you told her: ‘Hard to say’?”

“Please tell me.”

“She rubbed at Raylan’s legs! Like they were grieving. And that ain’t what you call buddies, huh?”

“Yeah… But I wouldn’t be jumping with joy either if I got back home to find out that my best friend turned out to be a bank-robbing Nazi clown,” says Art, and his argument is perfectly reasonable, but he keeps going back to how Raylan brought up that Steve McQueen movie, and his first reaction to it was a question to himself: can’t Raylan take the shit seriously, or is he trying to play it down?

“What I’m getting at is," Tais goes on, "maybe he doesn’t wanna seem compromised." 

And the folder. Raylan’s voice was monotone, distanced, but the folder was shaking in his hands. They didn’t even drink half a bottle for two for Christ's sake. And Raylan drank his order before opening the damn thing.

Art is tired but something resembling a foul… premonition starts to take shape inside him when he collects all the details of their friendly talk with the Givens’ duo.

“And why would he be afraid of me thinking he is compromised?” If he ain’t, Art doesn’t say, but he doesn’t have to. “After all, it’s not like Crowder has a pair of huge hypnotizing tits for Raylan to be sabotaged by the man.”

“Then, maybe it’s his hemispheres. I mean, Crowder makes some kind of a pretence to intellectuality and shit.”

“You know what? Let’s leave this for today,” asks Art, searching for the car key in his pant pocket. “We’ll see Raylan at work tomorrow and then you can add or extract from these speculations all you want.”

And it is unlikely that even if he stopped doing what he is doing and listened very closely he would hear the distant echo of a shooting at Bowman Crowder’s house happening exactly at this moment but twenty-four hours in the future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Art's daemon is a kea.
> 
> The song referenced in the chapter is, of course, Trinity by Annibale E I Cantori Moderni from They Call Me Trinity and Django Unchained.
> 
> Also, I would like to use this chance to explain one of my modifications of the daemon premise in case it has not been obvious from the very beginning: something leads me to believe that in the world with daemons in many cultures the names of the later would start with the last letters/sounds of their humans' names. 
> 
> And there is a tiny intentional reference to the character of Venus van Dam also played by Walton Goggins because why not.


	3. and Dewey

“The hand brake! The hand brake, Dewey!”

“Ohhh-ah, shit! Again!”

“You go! I’ve got it!”

“Sure? Cool, thanks!.. You’re the best.”

It takes Dewey half way to Ava’s house from where he just parked to understand. Abruptly, he stops and turns around with offence all over his face.

“Wait a minute... I can’t go in there without ya! And you know it.”

He receives no response and goes back to the car, swearing under his nose. 

Izzie has set the brake already, and the car stands still, and she’s just hiding in there now, like she would behind a rock in a desert if she was a real animal. Dewey purses his lips and speaks loudly into the car window:

“The hell, Izzie! Why would you do that?”

Again, she doesn’t respond, probably crawling somewhere under the seat. Dewey throws a helpless look at Bowman’s house and exasperatedly shifts from one foot to another, thinking to himself that they don’t have time for this! Boyd made crystal clear how much he wanted to have Ava in the church fast, and, man, he’s been in a real weird mood after letting go that Jared guy.

“Ever since our move from Florida,” Dewey murmurs into the car, “those hillbilly shitheads have been _inuciating_ that I am an idiot all the damn time.” Dewey makes an angry pause, trying to emphasize how dumb, and wrong, and ridiculous the _inuciation_ is, and it’s the only reason why it upsets him so much. “I don’t need my own daemon to make me feel like I’m stupid, too! Get out of there right now!”

The moment he says it, an accidentally philosophical question comes to Dewey’s mind: doesn’t it actually make him smart if Izzie is so smart that she can trick him? ‘Cause she’s kind of a part of him and stuff. He doesn’t think the thought till the end, though, as he sees Izzie’s ears appear from under the driver seat.

“Sorry, Dewey,” she apologizes, standing on the seat now, small and very ashamed. “That was mean. I shouldn’t have done that to you.”

Dewey instantly softens because he can’t be angry with her for too long, especially when she looks him in the eyes; she’s, like, his best friend…

“What is it that gotcha scared anyway?”

Izzie wrinkes up her nose.

“I don’t wanna see Abraham.”

“Well, guess what! I don’t wanna see him neither! Which is why we gotta do it together. Because I don’t see anybody else here to do the thing. So, please follow me, okay?”

“Okay.”

Dewey opens the car door, and Izzie jumps out, quick like a bullet.

“I can’t stand Abraham’s eyes,” she tells him as they approach the house to the sound of the pitter–patter of Izzie’s nimble feet on the gravel path.

“Yeah, those eyes are making my skin crawl every time I see ’em. He’s like an alien or somethin’.”

“And they hate our guts, he and Ava.”

“Well, we’ll see how they’ll hate us now that the big asshole coyote is gone and they’re on their own.”

It’s a huge relief for Dewey, for sure; he wouldn’t even try to come into that house all alone if Bowman and Annabelle were still alive.

“But ain’t it like uncle Devin used to say? That assholes ain’t nothing like bad teeth, and if you get rid of one, another will take his place in no time?”

“All his wisdom didn’t get uncle Devin far, did it?” snaps Dewey, who simply wants to enjoy the fact that there is minus one asshole around while he still can.

Izzie doesn’t follow him on the porch, just asking him shyly instead:

“I don’t actually have to go in, do I?”

Dewey sighs.

“But no hiding under the car seat no more! Wait right here till I get ’em out.”

She waves her tail.

Dewey enters the house without so much as knocking on the door and is surprised that the first thing he lays his eyes on is a tall man in all black, looking lost and not at all like the kind of a man you would normally see at Bowman’s house.

In the five seconds they’re staring at each other in silence, Dewey doesn’t find the man’s daemon on or near him and immediately feels superior to the stranger: she must be very small, much smaller than Izzie! Maybe an ant or a worm if he is what Dewey thinks he is. Dewey shares his guess, grinning condescendingly:

“Well, who the hell are you, the undertaker?”

The door behind his back shuts with a loud rattling.

The man doesn’t reply before putting his cowboy hat on, which Dewey didn’t notice first, just as he didn’t see the belt, the boots, and the horseshoe ring on his finger, but now that he sees them, _and_ the man is intently looking at him, Dewey suddenly regrets attracting attention to himself.

“I might be undertaking a situation here.” Dryly amused, the stranger sure doesn’t sound like somebody with an ant for his daemon. He also sounds like he is from Kentucky and not from Texas.

Dewey is still mechanically grinning at him, although weekly now, but then a big-ass leopard or lynx or something walks out of Ava’s kitchen, and Dewey freezes on the spot and simply forgets how to breathe, bawling his eyes out.

_OH SHIT. _

**DEWEY! WHAT IS IT?!**

If he could remember the word, Dewey would probably describe the spotted daemon as majestic. And absolutely piss-your-pants scary in every other way.

“Let me see your chest,” the man demands from him, and Dewey tears his eyes from the daemon only to look in the same eyes under the brim of the hat. He realizes what he’s been asked and obeys, only dimly aware at the moment that he could say no, or ask him what the hell, or that he doesn’t really have to be talking to the guy at all.

He bares his chest with pride – most people feel uncomfortable when they face his eagle – but the stranger isn’t least bit impressed. It reminds Dewey of how big predators always size you up in a I’m-checking-you-out-for-breakfast kind of way. And so, it’s no wonder that he feels exposed under this gaze; the feeling makes Dewey restless and is driving Izzie outside crazy.

_SHUT UP, IZZIE, I CAN’T HEAR A GODDAMN THING._

Dewey barely hears the man asking him over her shouting: “You buy that necklace or poach the gator and yank her teeth out?” while he himself is searching for signs of Ava or Abraham behind the man’s back because Dewey wants to leave the place badly now, thinking: could the stranger have killed them two?

“I shot her and ate her tail,” Dewey proclaims, implying with his tone that it should be a lesson to everybody who wants to mess with him.

“That would put you in Florida, around lake Okeechobee,” the man says casually, like he knows he can’t be wrong, and sips from his glass.

**DEWEY!**

“Belle glade,” admits Dewey and because he can’t stand this weird interrogation any longer and because the lynx hasn’t been moving towards him so far, he attempts to take the situation in his hands: “Who are you?”

The man slowly walks towards him and shows him his star: “Raylan Givens. I’m a Deputy United States Marshal…”

“Law enforcement usually doesn’t employ biggies,” interrupts Dewey without thinking about it.

“That would make me unusual, wouldn’t it?”

The question feels like it could be a joke, but it doesn’t sound like a joke when the weird cowboy marshal says it. It sounds like a warning.

“You mind telling me who you are? You know your name, don’t you?” Dewey instinctively tries to look at the lynx daemon again, but the marshal effortlessly prevents him from doing so, fixing Dewey’s eyes on his own face again by stating: “You’re talking to me, not to her.” His voice is definitely cooler this time.

Dewey realizes of whom the marshal reminds him with that unbacking-down stare and for some reason feels even more uncomfortable.

“I’m Dewey. Dewey Crowe.”

That unexpectedly sparks the marshal’s interest.

“I sent a boy to Starke from Belle Glade, fella named Dale Crowe Jr.”

“He’s my kin.”

“Huh.”

A loud yelp breaks the momentary silence between them: “Dewey!” It’s followed by the sound of wild scratching at the door behind Dewey.

“Is that your daemon outside, Mr. Crowe? Let her in.”

Dewey doesn’t see much of a choice for himself and opens both doors, only half-turning with his back to the marshal and his lynx. Izzie jumps into the house and then squeals, frantically peddling backward on her paws. She is hiding behind his left leg in no second. Dewey feels the urge to take her in his arms, which he hasn’t done with someone else around since he was ten.

“My god.” The marshal chuckles looking at them. “You know that Fennec foxes are native to South Africa?” He turns towards his daemon and explains: “Heard it on Discovery channel.”

It’s like the guy is mocking him, but Dewey doesn’t get it, and he’s too nervous anyway.

“Why the hell should I care?”

“Right. Where were we? I was just about to ask: what are you doing here, Mr. Crowe?”

“I come to take Ava someplace,” explains Dewey, hoping that maybe the marshal will let him go now. He also reckons that Ava and Abraham will probably feel much safer away from that lynx. “Ava!” he calls upstairs.

But before he can move in that direction, the marshal stops him with his hand.

“Hold on. Let me tell you something. You don’t walk into a person’s house unless you’re invited. What you better do is go on outside, you knock on the door.” The marshal actually shows him how to knock, like he holds him for an idiot. “Ava wants to see you, I'll let you in. She don’t, and you can be on your way.”

Dewey remembers that he has a shotgun in his car, and that completely changes the situation for him.

“Well, all right. I’m gonna go out… And then I'm coming back in,” promises Dewey and raises his eyebrows for emphasis.

Outside of the house, he feels way more self-confident. It ain’t gonna be so fun mocking him and Izzie whe he’ll be staring down that barrel…

“It’s a bad, bad idea, Dewey!” warns him Izzie, running in front of him, but Dewey has made up his mind. Oh, he has.

He is loading the weapon and walking back to the house, when the marshal’s voice startles him:

“Mr. Crowe.” Dewey raises the shotgun, but the marshal keeps strolling towards him and Izzie. His lynx daemon also got out and observes them from the house's porch, sitting all motionless like a statuette. “You better hold on there a sec while I explain something to you.”

The marshal finally stops walking, less than ten feet away. He sighs like he’s been in that situation a hundred times, and as he proceeds to explain, Dewey feels smaller with his every word.

“I want you to understand. I don't pull my sidearm unless I'm gonna shoot to kill. That's its purpose, huh, to kill, so it's how I use it. I want you to think about that before you act and it's too late.” The marshal doesn’t blink a single time delivering that speech, and Dewey’s grip on the shotgun tightens, becoming desperate.

“Jesus Christ, I got a scattergun pointed right at you.”

Dewey bares his teeth in the hope of seeming scarier or at least not as scared as he actually feels. 

The damn marshal nods calmly, like he’s heard that answer before some hundred times, too. Dewey wants but is also afraid to look at the lynx now. 

“Can you rack in a load before I put a hole through you?”

There is something nonchalant in his voice that makes Dewey practically feel that hole inside of him, and his heart instantly thinks into his shoes.

Izzie loses her nerve:

“Lose the thing, Dewey!!”

“Damn, Izzie, you’re supposed to be on my side!”

It doesn’t help that his voice breaks a little.

“I’m on the side of saving our asses!”

It crosses Dewey’s mind that she could just bite him in the leg to stop him now, which is probably her own thought, but instead of biting, she does something different while he's facing that marshal prepared to shoot him cold. She focuses him on the wind, and on the sun, and on the clouds moving behind the house, on the birds croaking and chirping nearby, on how it’s a beautiful day. And then, there is a small, barely audible thought.

**Dewey. I don’t wanna die.**

The marshal in front of him tilts his head a little like he has sensed the change in him and starts walking. Dewey steps back, and Izzie gets behind him. He doesn’t protest when the marshal ripps the shotgun from his hands and grabs him by the arm. He turns back to look at the house and the lynx daemon, but the marshal is strongly pulling him to the car.

“Where’d you want to take Ava?”

“Man, I don't understand you.”

“Boyd want to see her?”

“It’s none of your business.”

Dewey is actually astonished that the marshal mentions Boyd, but his surprise gets bigger a second later:

“You know Boyd and I were buddies?”

Dewey raises his head from the ground where he was looking to prevent the marshal from accidentally stepping on Izzie. He looks at the marshal, agreeing with Izzie, who thinks for him:

**Oh, so, that’s why you thought of Boyd before, when he stared...**

“We dug coal and drank beer together.” The marshal doesn’t look like he’s shitting him. “In fact,” he opens the car door and starts shoving him into the car as if to avoid questions, “you see him, you tell him I'm in Harlan, all right?”

Dewey allows to sit himself down and watches the marshal close the door and discharge his shotgun before throwing it on the passenger seat, barely missing Izzie.

“Hey,” the marshal grabs him by the shoulder, and Dewey finds himself looking in his eyes again. “If I was you, I'd give up this Nazi bullshit. Go back to poaching gators... safer for you and your little missy.”

Izzie hisses at him when he points at her with his finger.

“Next time I see you,” starts Dewey, choking on anger, “I’m gonna...”

He quickly sees the marshal’s scowl, and after that, the pain follows: it explodes in his mouth. Dewey feels warmth filling it and looks at the back of his hand that he brings closer to his lips. Blood escapes his mouth, and there is some of it on the wheel, too. Dewey is swallowing the rest of it as he stares at the back of the marshal walking back to the house, “You tell Boyd his old buddy wants to see him... Raylan Givens,” ringing in his ears.

He catches a glimpse of the lynx disappearing behind front door and feels like something has begun and that he and Izzie, who's jumped onto his knees and is licking him now, are in for a rough road.

*

“That hurt much?”

“Well, it ain’t nothing compared to what Boyd will do to us.”

“But what if they were real buddies? Don’t you think Boyd will be glad?”

“And what if they were? I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Izzie, the guy is a freaking marshal. _And_ an asshole.”

“It really works just like uncle Devin said.”

“It damn does.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more modification of the daemon setting from me that might be aparent in this chapter: adults and their daemons can be separated by longer distances than in Pullman's series. Imo, the human-daemon bond must become more elastic as children grow up and learn themselves. 
> 
> I know that I made a promise BUT there will be more than just a cameo of Boyd in the next chapter, and I think that it works much better than the original plan. I hope that the chapter is enjoyable despite his absence! I sure had a lot of fun writing it.


End file.
